Re: BTV blues...

Posted by BH On 2011/12/3 22:08:00

I never had a chance to inspect the BTV on my dad's old Exec, but none of my other Packards had any sort of gasket on the cap (and each was a bugger to get off). My dad seemed to think they were made of leather and rotted away over the years, and the average mechanic never realized they were missing. (The gills on the underside of the cap/plug are dead giveaway that it was intended to be vented to atmosphere.)

Since I wasn't able to track down an NOS example, and a rubber o-ring just squeezed right out, I thought I'd try making my own. A washer cut from rubber gasket stock split in relatively short order. I made another washer from a scrap of reasonably thick polypropylene sheet stock and it has worked well.

I've heard that the original was a copper washer, but in the absence of anything in black-n-white, I decided to do a little more sleuthing.

The parts books, both 51-54 and 55-56, show the filler plug gasket, in Gr. 1.337, as P/N 436369. Now that doesn't tell you much UNLESS you happen to check out the hardware listings in the "Utility Items" section; Gr. 50.660 offers a variety of "annular" gaskets. Listed among them is P/N 436369, which is of fibre material. The difference between O.D. and I.D. doesn't leave much meat, which may account for their disappearing act, but consider that the mating surface is only an upturned edge of the sheet metal cover.

Howver, this is not likely the cause of the mushy event.